


Land for a Lamb

by FireThatFox



Series: Japanese Folklore, Myths and legends [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Demon of Draught-Hiderigami, F/M, Itachi is more social but no less clever, Kizashi dies, Sasuke is spoiled and a brat, cause I always kill her parents, never trust a demon, oh yeah AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-10-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:21:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25782040
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FireThatFox/pseuds/FireThatFox
Summary: A drought has come upon a small nameless village in the Land of Fire on the boarder of Wind.  A forgotten region, poor and defenseless.  It's people suffer, it's young are sent to war never to return and it's leader Kizashi Haruno has to make some hard choices.His only daughter, Sakura, is forced to leave the village, for her people.There is a voice on the wind that whispers promises in her ears.  Caresses of sand dancing on the wind guide her to sanctuary...to salvation and offer her an ultimatum.Sakura was told to never make deals with the gods, but what of demons with eyes the color of shallow waters and hair the color of blood?
Relationships: Gaara & Haruno Sakura, Gaara/Haruno Sakura, Haruno Sakura & Uchiha Itachi, Haruno Sakura/Uchiha Itachi
Series: Japanese Folklore, Myths and legends [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1870282
Comments: 55
Kudos: 92





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hindeigami is a Japanese demon associated with drought. He is a vicious demon who dries up wells, steals the rain from the sky and keeps crops from growing. He is the demon of despair and starvation.
> 
> The inspiration was from Hinerigami for this tale, but the tale is mine.

Kizashi climbed out of the bottom of the dry well and rubbed the dust from his face with his cracked and bloodied hands. He was spent. Three weeks he had been harrowing, bearing no results for his efforts. Bloodshot eyes, weary from the fruitless toil, looked beyond, past the small assemblage of huts to the fields, as parched and as withered as his eyes.

‘How long’, he shook his head in anguish, how long before they starved to death. His wife was gone but his daughter, their village…

It had been weeks since the priest had come through, weeks since he had purchased the charm from the deceiver, to bless their fields with rain, with water...with life. Their pockets hung as desolate as their hearts. No rain had come. The priest’s charm had cost them their last coin. There was no more money to buy food, even if there was someone strong enough to fetch it.

He had made the last two trips alone, the first time coming back with a full cart of food, the second with only his miserable life. Thieves and vagrants needed to eat too and they were much better armed than he, or anyone in their village. Kizashi didn’t know what else to do..

“Father.” The voice like a silver bell, soft, light and feminine, his daughter brought a worn cup to his lips. “Drink.”

“No, Sakura, you drink it. The young will not remain healthy for long without water. If you fell ill, I don’t know what I would do.” Kizashi pushed the cup from his lips into his daughter’s bosom. “You drink it, please. I need to pray, perhaps Sunjin Sama will hear me this time.”

“I think your prayers fall on deaf ears Father.” Sakura whispered as she watched her father limp slowly away. His health was failing him. His arms were too thin, his hair too dull and his face gaunt with starvation. He had gone too long without food, without enough water to sustain him. He gave everything they had to her. 

He loved her, she was all he had left, but he was all she had left.

Sakura turned back to the empty well, the well that had provided their small modest village with water for the last century. The well had mysteriously gone dry overnight. 

Some claimed it was retribution for the last war, that they had not sent enough of their youth to fight and to die for the Land of Fire. Some condemned the Fire Daimyo for taking their youth and robbing them of their next generation, but others blamed her father Kizashi.

‘He traded his wife for his daughter’, they claimed. ‘A child born of greed’, they taunted him.

None of them knew the truth, they only believed what they wanted to believe, the worst in people, was the worst in them. Sakura’s mother had been loved by all, young and old, her death had been a tragedy the village had yet to overcome. It had been seventeen years since that day...seventeen years of wagging tongues, pointed fingers and barbed words.

Sakura clenched her fists and looked up into the sky. 

‘What have you to say for yourself Suijin?’, Sakura demanded of the water god, the one who had clearly forsaken them.

‘Suijin, is not here, there is only me’, a deep whispered gelidity fell around her.

“Who’s there?” Sakura spun on her heel but found no one. No one but the wind and grains of sand dancing over her feet.

Whispers escorted her to the small mud hut she shared with her father, the village leader, they were always whispering.

‘It’s her hair, that’s why we’re cursed, such an ugly anomalous color’, the women hissed as the heavy canvass fell in the doorway behind her. 

They could say what they liked about her, she had long since stopped caring about what they thought of her. Let the impotent tongues wag, let their eyes judge, her father would save them, they would see. Their mouths would be too full of water to criticize him, they would see…

Her eyes softened as she fell to her knees in front of her sleeping father. He had made it to his chair, just enough to sit. In his stagnate state, sleep had found him, he got so little, always...always working, digging, laboring, for ‘them’, the ungrateful, the lazy, the useless.

She hated them, she loathed them all more than she could ever say, more than they hated her for her anger was righteous, unlike theirs. Her nails dug into her palms as she clenched her fists, tiny little pin pricks one by one began to bleed. One drop, then two...a growl close by…What good is hate without levity. Their blame held no advantage, because it was false...but her hatred was heavy, dense and thick with disgust...warranted and without resolve.

“Who...are you?” Sakura whispered again, unsure if her ears had heard what had made her heart stop.

Silence...a soft groan of...desire, a warmth across her ear.

‘I could kill them for you, if you like’, the voice whispered in her ear, cajoling and smooth.

“No.” Sakura said aloud, her eyes closing against the desire to ask, to give in, to yearn.

‘It would be easy’, a snicker, a light touch to her cheek. ‘For you, I would do anything’

“Who are you?” Sakura rose to her feet and turned about in the small mud hut. There was nowhere to hide, she knew she was alone...as far as she could see. It was what she couldn’t see that worried her. She had heard the tales of the demons that walk in the houses of the dead, the desperate and the dying.

‘You know who I am’, the voice came again. 

It was always like this, had been for some time now. It would come to her when she was alone, or while her father slept. Rarely did it come to her in the open, like it had moments ago. It was becoming more audacious, more demanding, more enticing.

“I don’t know you, leave me please.” She said as loudly as she dared, casting a quick glance at her father’s slumbering form.

‘As you wish, but you will come to me...eventually’, the voice faded away. Sakura closed her eyes and took a deep breath. 

“Never, I will never come to you for anything.” Her voice faint, feeble even to her own ears.

There was no answer to her statement. It was gone, whatever it was. Moving across the room, she pulled a threadbare blanket from the shelf and threw it over her father. Looking at the open pantry across the way she bit her lips at their last bag of rice...half gone.

“Oh Father, what are we going to do?” She whispered, reaching out for her father’s hand and nuzzling it with her nose as she sat down in the dirt to sleep at his feet.

...a soft chuckle hummed through the air, glowing eyes the color of the Mediterranean sea loomed over the sleeping girl and her father. 

‘Soon’, the voice cooed, slowly the eyes closed and withdrew into the fading light.


	2. Chapter 2

_“There is too much blood Kizashi...I fear for her life and for the child’s.” The medicine man bowed his head low in remorse. He had done everything he could to save Mebuki. There was nothing more that he could do. She would either endure, or she wouldn’t. Her child would either live or they would both die._

_“Is there truly nothing, nothing at all that can help?” Kizashi asked the medicine man, eyes wavering between wretchedness and vexation._

_“Pray, for them both.” The man set his hand on the village leader’s shoulder and walked out of the mud hut._

_Kizashi fell to his knees beside his wife, beside their blood soaked bed and bowed his head._

_“Jizo Sama, protector of children please, hear me. Protector of women, travelers and newborns shield them. Take my life’s blood for theirs, a trade Jizo Sama, please, a trade, a life for a life, hear me.”_

_‘Jizo is not here headman, but I am. I have heard your plea. A life for a life, not quite a fair trade. Your blood is not worthy, what else will you offer me?’ A deep resonance filled the air, a cold reserve spread out around Kizashi making his wife stir from her exhausted insensibility._

_Mebuki groaned in pain._

_Drip. Drip._

_Her blood seeped through the bedding to the hollow platform, pooling in the dirt._

_‘She is not long for this world and the babe grows weak. Can you feel the cold headman, it settles in her bones, in the bones of your babe man, feel them...they grow cold with death. The shinigami is coming...to claim them both.”_

_Kizashi looked from his wife to his worn hands, hands that swore to provide and protect, hands that he swore would make her want for nothing, useless hands full of nothing but fragmented promises._

_“Whatever you want, please, save them, merciful spirit.” Kizashi bowed his head to the ground, his sweat soaked brow meeting the dirt of his floor. “Please save my baby, and I will give you anything you ask for, anything I have to give, as long as it is mine to give it, is yours.”_

_‘A life for a life wretched man, blood for blood. As long as it is yours to give, I will take it from you, as long as you live, I will come and I will claim it from you, as long as your hands till and move, the fruits of your exertion belong to me...everything you raise to grow is mine. Do you accept these terms, desperate mortal?’_

_“Yes.” Kizashi pressed his head to the floor, eyes closed, nails digging into the dirt by his ears that rang with warning…_

_‘Granted. A contract has been made. Seal it with your blood, a signature to my claim.’_

_“Thank you nameless spirit of the Earth.” Kizashi drew his blade from his belt and slashed his hand, squeezed, and watched the blood trickle down and over the head of his wife, a blessing, a curse._

_“Your name, Spirit Sama, who do I thank for this favor?” Kizashi lifted his head, his eyes closed._

_A quiver of light, a silhouette cast and stretched along the floor to the feet of his beloved, moving slowly up her legs to her womb settling over her abdomen._

_‘Hiderigami’, the demon murmured, voice as deep and dry as the desert seas. ‘I will return one day, to collect your debt, anticipate my coming on the whispers of the wind.’_

_“Hiderigami Sama! No! I wanted...this is not what I wanted...I decline, I retract my offer demon!” Kizashi cried out but it was too late, he knew, he had offered his blood, had given his word, he had cursed them all for his selfishness…_

_A maniacal chortle shook the room, deafening in its intensity. ‘Fool. The shinigami waits for no man, but your child is safe, for now. I will come again. Wait my return...mortal, and look after what is mine.’_

_Kizashi rose to his feet, fists shaking, his body trembling in anger. He had been tricked, the merciful god he had thought heard his plea had been a demon...what deal had he made, what calamity had he invited into his home._

_“Kizashi.” Mebuki’s voice cut through his rage. “Kizashi, I feel my life leaving me. I pray, Lord Jizo, watch over her.”_

_“A demon makes deals nothing more, but the gods give blessings. Show Jizo Sama you are worthy of his pity, of his divine blessing Kizashi. Take care of our child, a life for a life, that was the deal. Our child will live and I will die.” Mebuki lifted her hand and reached out to her husband._

_“Mebuki.” Kizashi moaned, he couldn’t lose her, he would have nothing without her, she was his life._

_“I’ll be watching over you both.” Mebuki’s fingers fell from his grasp and she breathed out one last breath caught by the wind that swept through their hut leaving nothing behind but desolation._

_Kizashi hung his head, his wife was gone, his babe was…_

_...a piercing wail rent the air, a baby’s cry of life yet lost, new breath, new life filled the air and warmth spread out around him. Outside the Sakura trees bloomed, blossoms exploded from the trees and rained down over the modest hut in celebration of both life and death._

_A strong wind picked up the blossoms and swirled them through the windows, the fragile petals falling over the face of his child, pastel pink petals, that matched her hair._

_‘My beloved’, the wind whispered, caressing the infant._

_Kizashi picked his daughter up from between his dead wife’s legs and severed their first and last bond with his bloodied blade. One drop, then two fell like crushed rubies to the floor of the hut. Bonded blood, a curse and a blessing._

_A howling of the wind, a chuckle by his ear. ‘Remember your promise’, a taunting smoothness, a reminder, a threat._

_Kizashi bowed his head over his wife’s last gift, a symbol of their eternal devotion to one another and wept. The tears of his regret mixed with their blood._

_New green eyes the color of Spring opened to their new world._

_‘Sakura’, Hiderigami purred. ‘Thrive my flower, we will meet again’_


	3. Chapter 3

“I must Sakura, for the village.” Kizashi said, as he kissed her hand and patted her head.

“No, Father.” Sakura pleaded, she tried, it was no use he was going and wouldn’t listen to her objections.

Kizashi looked at his daughter and faltered, her beautiful eyes wet with tears, her skin dry from the harsh sun and sand that surrounded them. He wouldn’t fail her, not again, not like he had failed her mother, his wife Mebuki.

“I will come back, Sakura, I promise.” He kissed her hand once more and turned, back straight, a proud man, and took one step, then another.

‘He won’t come back’, the voices had already started to whisper before her father had even stepped across the first dune and away. 

‘Dead man walking’, they sneered behind her back, laughing at her misery.

“Do you think he does this for himself? For me?” She whirled on her heel, dark green eyes challenging their cowardice, condemning them all, all who dared to speak behind her.

“He does it for you.” She pointed at a mother and a child. 

“For you!” She waved her hand at an old man sitting on a chair outside of his hut.

“For all of you.” Her head dropped to her chest, her tears dry and salty against her cheek, they stung, it hurt but no more than the sand that rolled and tumbled in the wind erasing the traces of her Father’s steps.

Sakura turned and walked back to her hut, she pushed the shredded fabric aside and let it drop back down behind her. The whispers, they followed, always whispering, she plugged her ears with her fingers and shut her eyes, falling down face first onto her bed, her father’s bed.

‘All alone now’, a deep voice cooed beyond the boundaries of her stoppered ears. 

‘So alone’, a gentle caress to her still salted cheek.

‘I will help you, my beautiful one’, the voice persisted.

‘I alone care for you, my beloved’, Sakura turned her head and tried to force the voice from her head, always that voice, that deep smooth cajoling voice, tempting her, pressing her insistently...touching her.

‘Say my name, I am already yours. Say my name, for you are already mine. Call out to me my love and I will come to you. Call out to me and I will give you the world’, the voice sang softly in her ear, lifting her hair, blowing softness against her skin.

A sigh on the wind and it was gone. As quickly as it had come, it had left her. She was alone.

With a greater effort than it ought to have required, Sakura rolled onto her back and stared up at the fissures in the ceiling of her mud hut. He would be back. “He promised.” She breathed to the empty air.

“He promised.” She closed her eyes and fell asleep.

_‘What will you give me?’, he stood tall and straight, his face in the shadows of the trees._

_“Who are you?”, Sakura pushed up from the ground, gasping as her fingers dug into green grass instead of hot sand, as she sat up and looked around._

_‘You know who I am’, the deep voice flowed across the grass to her feet and crept up her legs to push the hair back from her face and over her shoulders. ‘What will you give me’_

_“I do not know you.” She insisted, sitting up taller, straighter to show him she was not afraid. ‘‘What do you want, I have nothing to give you’’_

_‘Of course you do, for I have been with you, every hour of every day since your birth, my beloved’, long fingers reached out from his side, fine silk of dark maroon and tan sketched the curves of his forearm. His fingers flexed, as if to draw her to him, but otherwise, he didn’t move. ‘Love, I want your love...my beloved’_

_Sakura swallowed hard. What was this, a demon, a god? Who was this man..._

_“Stand where I can see you.” She called to him. “I can not distinguish your face.”_

_A deep chuckle, a shiver in the air around her…’There is no need to discern my face, when we share a soul’, he took one measured step forward, the bottom half of his face came into view._

_Soft lips pulled up into a half smile, a smirk drew her eyes. Smooth skin as pale as moonlight adorned a strong masculine jaw. Transfixed, she watched his lips shift…’Say my name, my angel, my love and come away with me. You are unattended, there is no one left for you...but me.’_

_“That’s not true!” She stood and shook her fist. “My father will return to me, he promised me!” She challenged him._

_‘No, my dear. He will not, you are...very much alone’, the man stepped back into the shadows, for surely he was a man, there was no other name she knew…_

_‘I will come again...when you are more...resigned, when you see, that there truly is no one left for you, but me’, he cooed to her, his voice carrying to her on the grains of sand…_

Sakura woke in the same position she had fallen asleep in with a tenderness in the back of her head. “What an appalling dream.” She muttered, reaching for the pitcher on the stand beside the bed.

It was empty, like the shelves...she turned her head to the bag of rice, less than a quarter full.

“He will come back to me. I’m not alone.” She said with forced conviction, refusing to give into the dark, to the void, to despair.

She was in her hut, mending her blanket, when she heard the shouting outside. With her needle and her thread in hand, she moved to the canvass that covered her door, and pushed it aside. She gasped. Men...too many to count on horses were riding into her village, and her father was not at home.

Sakura threw down her needle and ran her fingers through her long hair, tying it up and back with a cord. She was the headman’s daughter, the figurehead in his absence, she would have to welcome these men into her village...alone.

With haste she pulled her mother’s apron from the chest at the end of the bed, the only nice clothes she had, and tied it around her waist. She pulled her father’s sash from his armour and tied it around her head to hold back her bangs. A quick scrub of her face with her spit...she stepped out of her hut to receive the strangers, for better or for ill.

“What do we have here?” A taunting voice broke through the humm of the men before her. “A filthy urchin I see.”

Dark eyes cast a warning glance, down and aside, to the one who spoke. “Do not degrade those we wish to request shelter from, Sasuke.” The older of the two reprimanded.

“I apologize for my brother. May we speak with the headman, Kizashi Haruno, please?” The man spoke with sincerity, power and reserve.

“I am Sakura Haruno, Kizashi’s daughter. My father is not in the village presently. What may I do for you?” Her eyes passed over his armour and his smooth skin, aristocratic hands and the proud chin of his younger brother. “My lord?”

“I see.” The older man seemed to consider her words before speaking again. 

“When will he return? I am Itachi uchiha, and this is my brother Sasuke Uchiha. We have come for your able bodied, war is upon us.” He bowed to Sakura from his saddle, making the younger Uchiha scoff with disdain at his efforts.

“Again…” Sakura took a bewildered step backward. 

“Have you not already taken all of our young men, my father’s health, our food?” She clenched her fists at her sides, anger filled her heart...they had given them everything they had to give already, there was nothing left for them to give!

“You dare speak to my elder brother with such contempt? You will be punished!” The man called Sasuke dismounted from his horse, grabbed his whip from his saddle, and advanced on Sakura with a narrowed eye.

She could hear the whispering behind her.

‘She’s disturbed.’, they said. ‘She’ll get us all killed’, they choked out.

“Enough Sasuke.” Itachi Uchiha dismounted, walked to his brother and placed a hand over the handle of the whip, pulling it from his younger brother’s grasp. “We didn’t come here for that.”

“Itachi…” Sasuke began to protest.

“I said enough, Sasuke.” Itachi’s voice didn’t raise, but the depth and the tone did, a promise that if his younger brother persisted...it would be Sasuke and not Sakura to get whipped.

“As you say.” Sasuke gave Sakura one last fleeting glare before bowing his head in submission to his brother and stepping back...and then away.

“We did not come here for your food. I am sorry to hear of your father’s ill health and if you have no able bodied men to give us, we humbly beg you shelter for the night and water for our horses.” Itachi inclined his head to Sakura who nodded most graciously, then smirked.

“I fear there will be little water for your horses, much less your men.” Sakura waved a small hand to the dry well behind his men. “Our only source of water went dry, near on seven days ago and it has yet to rain...as I am sure you are aware.”

Itachi turned his head and looked over his shoulder at the well she had waved to, walked over to the mouth and peered inside. “Hn.”

“Well then.” Itachi removed his helmet and scratched his chin thoughtfully. 

“It seems we have no alternative. Shisui!” He called to a tall man who was standing beside his brother.

“Yes, Itachi Sama?” The man bowed to Sakura and turned back to his lord with a knowing grin.

“It seems these people are in need of our assistance, unload the wagons, we will stay the night.” Itachi waved the man Shisui away, walking past Sakura into her hut uninvited.

“Excuse me, but what do you think you are doing inviting yourself into my home?” Sakura demanded, her hands on her hips as she watched the young lord untie his heavy plate armour and lift it up over his head, setting it on her chair by her empty hearth.

“Staying the night.” Itachi looked at her as though his intentions had been clear. “My men will house with the rest of your villagers. I will stay here with you, as I am their commander and you are the headman’s daughter.”

Sakura’s mouth dropped open in disgust and shock. “If you think that I will entertain you like that you have …” 

Itachi raised his hand in the air to silence her. Sakura’s green eyes flashed a savage emerald green, the color of deep seas before a deadly storm.

“I meant no offense, or insinuation. You are a beautiful woman, but I have no interest in ah...you entertaining me like that.” Itachi continued to untie his armour, smirking at her huffing noises behind him as he turned away from her. “I would appreciate dinner however.”

Sakura glared at him, then laughed a bitter laugh. “I hope you enjoy hot water then, because that is all I have to offer you.”

“Is it?” Itachi threw a heavy sack at the girl, it’s weight making her take two steps back as it impacted with her chest, her arms wrapping around it to keep from dropping it.

“What is this?” She hissed without moving to look into the bag.

“Dinner.” Itachi bowed correctly to her, then laid down on her father’s bed without permission and closed his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Discord server: https://discord.gg/8r5Mza


	4. Chapter 4

Itachi could hear her seething behind his back and smirked into her threadbare blanket that had been thrown onto the bed in haste, the needle and thread still stuck through the top. What would she do, he wondered, make them dinner or stab him in the back?

He hadn’t been to her village before. Last time, it was his father who had come here to collect their men. He was surprised to see such a beautiful woman here in a place like this and wondered...why his father hadn’t brought her back with him to the compound.

Her father must have hidden her, but her father wasn’t here now. Briefly, he wondered, where the man was and what had drawn him from his village. What was so dire that he would leave his daughter among...them.

He had heard the whispering. She was very much surrounded and very much alone here.

“Fine.” She hissed. “It would be my pleasure Lord Uchiha.” She said sarcastically.

“Would you prefer the chicken or the fish?” The woman said with taunting sweetness as she rummaged through the bag he had thrown at her.

Itachi chuckled quietly to himself. She certainly was entertaining.

“Fish, if it pleases you, Sakura.” Itachi rolled over in her father’s bed and watched her freeze. Her hands half in and half out of the worn but sturdy canvas bag he had pressed upon her.

“You didn’t think I was asleep, don’t look so surprised.” Itachi watched her eyes narrow then widen as she made a moderate attempt at civility. She was...diverting.

Sakura ignored him, pulling a small cooking pot from her shelves behind her, her only cooking pot and began cutting the dried fish into smaller more frugal pieces with the blade she had pulled from the Uchiha’s armor.

“By all means, please use my knife, keep it if you like it.” Itachi continued to watch her. Her shoulders stiffened. “I have another.”

Sakura continued to ignore the man who had bludgeoned his way into her village, into her home, turning correctly on her heel to pull his flask from the chair where he had set his things. She pulled the cork from the lip and sniffed cannily. 

Water. She licked her lips, suppressing the sudden urge to upend the flask and drink her fill. Slowly she poured half of the flask into the cooking pot, corked it, and placed it back on top of his other bag that he had thrown down carelessly after he had entered her hut earlier.

Moving to the bag once more she pulled out the small bag of rice she had seen and measured out one heaping handful, threw it into the pot, and stirred.

Itachi watched the woman move about her small hut, she was clearly looking for something but...oh yes, of course. “Allow me.”

Stretching slightly, he rose from the bed and took the two small steps toward her hearth, made the hand sign and blew a thin stream of fire to light her fireplace with.

“How did you...what are you?” Sakura raised her hands out in front of her and flattened herself up against the wall of her hut, her eyes wide with fear. 

“Demon.” She muttered, all the bravado and sass evaporated in the heat of his fire.

Itachi laughed, a low laugh. “Hardly, although I have heard that some of our enemies refer to us Uchiha as such, but not because of our fire nature, but because of our eyes.” 

Itachi tapped his temple, his eyes bled red, his tomes spun wildly then settled into an intricate sort of shape.

Sakura screamed. He was a demon, she knew it, he had come to eat her soul, to strip her of her youth and to devour her whole. Only demons had red eyes...

“Sakura please…” Itachi took a step toward the woman, he hadn’t meant to frighten her, he ought to have known better. She had probably never met a shinobi before, much less an Uchiha with the Mangekyo Sharingan.

The door to Sakura’s father’s hut burst open, sand flowed into the small hut like water, pushing the Uchiha up against the wall and away from Sakura.

“What evil is this?” Itachi jumped, dodged and deflected the waves of sand with his forearms crossed before his chest like a shield, his chakra flaring powerfully.

What was this feeling, why did it hurt...Sakura fell to the ground as the sand continued to move around her. She felt sick, like there was this heavy unbearable pressure pushing her down, into the ground. “Ita Itachi Sama…”

‘Tsk.’ The sand rose up around her. ‘You’ll say his name but not mine? I, who have watched over you for so long, cared for you, waited for you…my beloved’

The voice was back, why now…”Please, it...hurts.” Sakura choked, hunched and leaned over her knees. “Please help me.”

A gentle caress against her face...sand exploded around her drying her tears.

‘Anything, for you’

“Itachi!” The younger Uchiha ran into the hut, his blade out, his eyes red like his brothers scanning the room, batting at the sand. “What is this evil?”

“Evil?” Sakura gasped. She couldn’t breathe. The pressure was too much, she was going to...her eyes closed as her body crumpled to the ground unconscious.

Sand continued to move around her in waves. 

‘It’s their fault’ A deep voice filled her subconscious. ‘If they had never come here this wouldn’t have happened’ It roared.

‘Mine, she’s mine’ It cooed over and over until sand filled the hut from floor to ceiling, breaking against the walls, knocking them from their place as they too, like the woman, crumbled to the floor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gah, it's been so long since I've updated this. I feel like I have lost the rhythm.


	5. Chapter 5

Shisui Uchiha tucked his white amulet with the star of Suijin Sama back into the covered folds of his shirt and pulled Itachi from the sand by the arms.

“I thought you told us not to cause any trouble Itachi?” His cousin smirked as he dusted himself off. “ You completely destroyed her house.” Shisui motioned to Sakura, who was also being pulled up by the arms front he sand, by Sasuke.

“Hey, take it easy will ya? She’s been through a lot.” Shisui walked over to Sasuke and hit him hard over the back of the head.

“Would you desist!” Sasuke glared at his older cousin, the man was a menace, an annoying menace. “She is to blame for this, do you not know who that was?” Sasuke demanded his glare divided equally from his brother to his cousin.

This wasn’t the end, this wasn’t over. Itachi could still feel it’s presence. Shisui may have driven it away momentarily with the blessing of Suijin, but it would return. It would return for...

“Don’t speak so harshly Sasuke, or presume too much.” Itachi warned his younger brother. It wouldn’t do to speak of such things in front of the woman, or her villagers. Itachi looked around them, from ragged face to thirsty mouth and knew...no good would come of this.

The worst had yet to come.

“It’s the demon, Hinde…” Sasuke started to speak but was silenced by his cousin’s sword to his neck.

“Your brother told you to be silent.” Shisui quirked his eyebrow at the youth, rolled his eyes, then lowered his sword slowly from Sasuke’s neck. 

“As you say, there is trouble, see that you don’t escalate it.” He nodded toward the pink haired woman who was raising herself to her feet unsteadily, ignoring the growing whispers of the villagers around her, the glares and the ill concealed finger pointing. They weren’t even trying to hide their condemnation from them.

“Sakura, forgive me. Your home.” Itachi looked at the mound of sand that used to be her hut, a modest hut, but her home nonetheless. “We will build you another.” He offered generously.

“Why?” Someone yelled from the gathering crowd.

“Take her with you.” A voice jeered.

“Good riddance!” A rock flew through the air aimed at Sakura’s head. Itachi spun catching the rock and crushing it in his palm to dust.

“Enough.” Itachi rose to his full height and looked down his nose at the gathered mob. “Have you no sympathy for one of your own, how can you speak like this of your head man’s daughter?”

Shisui watched with Sasuke as the faces around them contorted into varying forms of loathing and hatred.

“She is not one of us. Let her rot.” An old man spoke.

“Her father sold her mother’s soul for hers.” A woman cried out, a shaking finger pointed at Sakura.

Itachi raised his hand. “Be still.”

He turned to Sakura. “Please accept my apologies Haruno San, for your home. You said your father is away. Would you...like us to escort you to...him?”

‘That won’t do…’ A whisper in the wind...

Sasuke watched the woman straighten her back and raise her chin. She didn’t cry, or beg or scorn those who had spoken ill of her or her father. She didn’t even look at them. She looked, at Itachi.

“Thank you for your offer, but I decline.” Sakura bowed gracefully from the waist, knelt down to the ground, cupped her hands and began to...dig. “This is my home. This is my village. I have nowhere else to go.”

‘You belong to me…’ He cooed in her ear.

She ignored the voices behind her, the ugly words of those her father had left to help, the accusations of those who thought without thinking, the spite of the weakened...it meant nothing to her, they meant nothing to her.

“Sakura.” Itachi bent down beside her, taking her hands in his. “You can not stay here.”

“I can not leave, my father will return. If he returns to find me gone…” She shuddered at the despair that would fill her father’s heart.

‘Such a good girl you are, my beloved…’

Itachi’s voice was low, quiet so that only she could hear. “You don’t know do you?” He watched her eyes. “The sand Sakura, you know who commanded that sand don’t you?”

“I…” No, she didn’t know his name, but she knew his voice, she knew his touch and the color of his eyes… “I do not know his name but…”

A soft chuckle, a light caress to her cheek, the back of her neck, the pressure of something heavy against her back...she shivered.

“...but you know, what he is don’t you.” Itachi leaned close to her, waiting for her to answer him. She was scared he could tell, but he wasn’t sure if she was frightened of him or if it was…

“Hiderigami.” Sasuke Uchiha spoke the name of the Demon of the Draught.

A wave of hot air blew Sakura’s hair away from her shoulders, that presence again, that choking weight like buried death coursing through her skin, she felt like she was choking, like she was about to be consumed.

“Sasuke!” Itachi stared at his foolish little brother. “You fool! You do not speak something's name if you do not wish for it to come!”

Sakura looked down at her hands. Grains of sand floated around her wrists, slowly moving in between her fingers and...Itachi’s. “What is...is this…”

Itachi looked back at the woman, then at their hands where… “It’s you...he wants, you.” Itachi’s eyes went wide, he let go of her hands and leapt back from the woman. He understood now, the words of the villagers...what it truly meant.

‘I have come, it is time…’

The sand moved around Sakura, swirling up into the air and falling back down in a beautiful display of golden grains dancing upon the wind. Her pink locks that had come free with the destruction of her hut floated among the golden grains and sparkled in the light.

The moon was raising, the sun had set, soon...it would be night…

“Cursed, we’re cursed.” The villagers left for their homes one by one, wary of the wind.

“Her father made a deal with the demon and now we will all pay with our lives.” They moaned as they shut their doors on her, turned their backs on her, and left her with...strangers.

‘Do not be afraid my beloved, you need not fear, I am here...you are not alone’ Soft warm wind caressed her face, ran through her hair and kissed her temples. ‘You are not homeless, for your home, is with me’ The voice cooed.

‘I will build you a castle in the Land of Wind, you will want for nothing...ever again’

“Are you...a demon or a…” Sakura swallowed.

‘I have many names, but only one love...only one that need part from your lips. Say my name and I will take you away, say my name and I will help you find your father’ 

Sakura closed her eyes and wet her lips with her tongue. “Hinderi…”

“Sakura. Don’t, you don’t know what you’re about to set free, you have no idea what you will unleash if you say his na…” Itachi tried to stop her but it was too late.

“Gami.” Sakura opened her eyes, the golden sand dropping around her.

“Itachi, we must leave, please this is not our fight this is not our…” Shisui flickered to his cousin’s side, grabbed him around the waist just as Itachi had begun to reach out for the woman and flickered out into the desert where Sasuke was with the rest of their men, running away as fast as they could with their lives.

A dark, heavy mirth some chuckle rumbled across the desert and vibrated the mud huts surrounding them. The Earth moved in waves, sand rolled like water throughout the village upsetting the foundation of the houses, cracking their pitiful walls and crumbling them to the ground.

Pillars of sand, torrents and columns of power exploded from the ground moving quickly through the village decimating everything in their wake.

Only the ground beneath Sakura...remained calm.

Sakura watched with wide horrified eyes as a mighty wall of sand and wind ripped through the remaining chaos taking her visibility from her eyes in a storm as it swept past her, engulfing the place of her birth. Blinding sand, that’s what it was called, bloody sand...a mass grave.

Sakura threw her arms up over her head when the screaming began. She plugged her ears with her fingers when the screaming had stopped, fooling herself, wishing the screaming would continue, because it would mean someone was still alive…

She didn’t know how long she had remained hunched over in upon herself, or how long the sand had ravaged her village but she knew that it was over when he came to her again...in a new form.

“Do not weep for them my love, they were nothing to you but empty words and soulless casings.” 

A warm hand rested against her back, agile fingers combed her hair back from her eyes. Sakura turned her head and looked up into eyes the color of shallow waters and hair the color of fresh blood, like the blood that surrounded her, soaking into the sand.

“Hiderigami Sama?” Sakura blinked, he was the man from her dream, he was...here, he was real.

“Yes, Sakura.” He cooed. 

“Yes.” He lifted her up into his arms, his bare feet pressing bloody footprints into bloody sand as he walked out of what remained of her village, into the desert.

Kizashi Haruno walked over the final dune that lay between himself and his home. He had been blessed by the kami of good fortune and had found a nomadic caravan that had taken pity on him and his tale. It wasn’t much but he carried over his shoulder a large bag filled with flasks of water, fish and bread. 

Sakura would eat well tonight and have the first drink from the flask. He had missed her greatly and looked eagerly over the crest, toward home.

Kizashi Haruno stopped at the crest of the dune and gasped. He looked down into the flattened Earth that had been his village and saw the carnage, the death and the wreckage. 

“Sakura!” His dry throat screamed the name of his only daughter as despair filled his heart.

He dropped his bag and ran toward his village, toward the place he had left his daughter. He fell to his knees before the scrap of canvas that used to hang over his door, protecting his daughter from the harsh desert winds and wept.

A pain filled his chest that shot straight through his soul to his heart. “My girl…”

He closed his eyes. There was no feeling in his right arm and he couldn’t see past the tears, past the darkness that was filling his head. “Mebuki, I’ve failed you I’ve…”

Laughter filled his head.

‘I told you head man, I would be back one day to claim what was mine. Your blood was not enough, your blood was not worthy...not a fair trade.’

Flashes of Sakura filled his head. She was standing in front of a castle made of sand in the arms of a man with teal eyes and hair as red as fresh blood, smiling into his face.

‘A life for a life desperate soul, our deal is complete, you will die today, but die well knowing your daughter will live forever, happy by my side’

Kizashi Haruno fell to the ground, his hand over his heart as one last tear seeped from the corner of his eye to run down the side of his lifeless cheek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not all legends, myths or folklore have happy endings! :)


End file.
